Twinkle Twinkle what a STAR! .

I'm so excited to finally show you my new project with picture book legend Katharine Holabird and Hodder. It will be published on September 4th.


Introducing - Twinkle! - A new little fairy with a cheeky twinkle in her eye - always ready to try new things and often getting it badly wrong!

Twinkle is my first fairy, and in all honesty I feel that it took me a while to 'connect' with my own fairy magic. My teenage years were full of writing miserable poetry and concentrating of being a hippy with goth tendencies. This seeped into my illustration. I loved shadows, dark colours, sinister and quirky imagery. Even my first few picture books were a delight for me, revelling in Witches, witches cats, magic and Dragons. 

However, before I went all dark and shadowy I loved fairies as a small child. I once dreamed of getting married wearing beautiful fairy wings. I often devoured the original flower fairy books. My favourite was May (my birthday), the Daisy fairy (all the hours making daisy chains left a lasting impression) and the Bluebell fairy as I lived near to a woodland covered in bluebells and used to spend many hours there in the carefree 1970's. I also remember spending lots of time in my Nains small back yard gazing at the fuchsias after she'd told me they were flower ballet dancers, which they really were. 

And so, around 32 years after I'd gotten over my fairy-flower love - I felt pleasantly surprised when Hodder mentioned to me the possibility of illustrating a new fairy character from the pen of the well-renowned Katharine Holabird. At first, I really believed that I couldn't do it. I felt that I wouldn't be able to make it pretty and magical enough. I suppose I was scared I wouldn't do it justice.  However, after a bit more thought I felt that it would be a new challenge and I set about re-connecting with my inner fairy. 

I needn't have worried. Having my studio in the garden, it seemed all set up for me. All the childhood fun was just waiting in the back of my mind just waiting to come out. I even remembered that when I  did get married I wore a huge sparkly daisy in my hair and had a simple bouquet of white daisies.

After playing around for a while with characters, I concentrated on nature and all its shapes and colours.

 Fairy wings were dragon fly wings, all delicate and vibrant with colour. 

Fairy dresses were flowers. 

Twinkle (Daisy) - I think Twinkle was always going to have a daisy dress in the back of my mind.

Twinkles friend Lou-Lou (Primrose)

Twinkles friend Pippa (fuchsia)

Fairy houses were seed pods and conkers. 

Fungi and toadstools became a fairy school and houses. 

All of this close up of nature culminated for me in my favourite spread of the book - the endpapers. Endpapers are often my favourite part of creating a book (see previous posts in the archive). Endpapers for me are a 'free' to explore things that don't have to necessarily move on the story. However with Twinkle the endpapers seemed to be the key to everything. I wanted to draw a tree in which all the fairy seed pods were hanging. Then it came to me. What if the whole of Twinkles world was set in a huge magical tree? We all decided to go for it. It was the first spread I coloured and I feel that it set the tone, colour and village plan for the whole world. 

Endpapers

SparkleTree Forest (detail)

Maybe the beginnings of Twinkle were laid decades ago amongst the flowers of the back garden and the woods? After all this re-connecting with nature and after using nearly every shade of pink I could conjure up from my colour palette - Twinkle is ready to shine! She's a great little fairy full of feisty fun and a hint of clumsiness. 

with a great array of forest animals who aren't afraid to show their feelings! 

Twinkles world is everywhere. Just a walk in the woods or the garden will show you. Next time you find a conker shell, a seed pod or even a beautifully coloured leaf maybe, just maybe……you've stumbled into Twinkles part of the forest?

For the love of endpapers

Opening up a picture book, before you even get to the title page, you catch a glimpse of artwork that gives you a tantalising snapshot, detail or mood of the story you're about to read. Silently (and often not so silently) I make a little 'Wooo' noise. Don't you love endpapers? I just adore them.

As an illustrator, endpapers can just be a dream. If there's time in the deadline the trusting designer and editor can often give you free rein to run slightly amok. Not to disrespect any talented authors, but there's no text to work around for just these two moments. The illustration equivalent of an indulgent rock guitar solo perhaps? 

I've indulged myself today with including some endpapers of my own that I've really enjoyed doing, followed by (badly) scanned copies of some beautiful examples by other artists that are my particular favourites. 

FIRST! Sneaky peek - I'm including the endpapers from my new book 'Mabel and Me - Best of Friends' with Mark Sperring and Harper Collins (out end of March 2013). I had so much fun with these. I hope you enjoy.

Mabel and Me - Best of Friends - front endpapers

Mabel and Me - Best of Friends - back endpapers

Endpapers for 'The Rumblewick Letters - My Unwilling Witch' by myself and Hiawyn Oram, Orchard books 2006. Great fun to work on these. My lovely designer literally let me go a bit mad with a half hearted idea about a 'map' on the understanding that I would just redo it if it turned out to be awful! I worked on a stretched piece of tea-stained paper, planned virtually nothing and just used black ink. The only thing I half planned was trying to fit 13 chimneys on the house (as in the name of the address in the text). The adrenaline really flowed. It literally was like taking a line for a walk.

Front endpapers from 'My Adventure Island' by Timothy Knapman and myself, Scholastic 2012. The book was about a boy imaging himself on his own island. I loved the challenge of bringing in subtle hints of 'home' that appear throughout the book.

Back endpapers 'My Adventure Island'.

And here's some real favourites that make me go 'Woooo'.....

'Olivia' by Ian Falconer, Simon and Schuster 2000. I just LOVE the Olivia books. The minimal use of red as the only colour against the beautifully simple black and white line drawings of Olivia and her surroundings are just a treat to the eyes. These endpapers sum up the feel of the book perfectly.

'Mr Peek and the misunderstanding at the Zoo' by Kevin Waldron, Templar 2008. There's so much I like about this book. Each page is superbly illustrated, the animals hugely full of character. The colours are are muted with a 'vintage' feel without being dull. These endpapers just sum it all up. It makes me feel like the story is timeless...just makes you want to dive in.

'Mr Pusskins and little whiskers' by Sam lloyd, Orchard books 2007. This is a great book which my children loved (please note the green felt tip just off the edge!). This is a lovely example of an endpaper setting up a story just making you want to carry on to read what on earth is going on. Great energy in the illustrations. Just look at that little kitten...he couldn't possible be horrible in any way, could he?

So there you are. You've got to love a good endpaper. Please don't flip past them, as they are often a perfectly visual 'Once upon a time....' and a little 'Full stop' to the whole reading experience.